Please help tank going down SOUTH FAST!

[Starry]

Dinos = dinoflagellates. kinda like cyno-bacteria. red slimy algae looking stuff.

As for your acro, the tissue recession is generally referred to as STN, or RTN, depending on the speed of the recession and is sometimes caused by bacteria as well as several other possible causes. Cutting the coral well above the affected area sometimes stops the spread of tissue loss, saving the coral.

I would also try and knock your phosphate down using GFO, 0.25 is pretty high, could be causing the browning of your other corals.

Best of luck!

[Spyd]

I agree with everyone. Run carbon and GFO to battle whatever is going on and reduce phosphates. .25 PO4 is quite high and would definitely cause some browning out of SPS. Judging by the pics, your SPS are RTN'ing. Chop off the good part of your SPS and mount them on frag plugs. That is the only way to potentially save them at this point. The second SPS get stressed, they can die off within hours. The die off will only cause more nutrients and can set off a chain reaction.

Water changes of at least 25% to even 50% would be good at this point to help reduce your nitrates, PO4, etc.

[spit.fire]

Are you using ro/di water?

If not then I'd strongly suggest getting a system

How deep is your substrate? Gravel or sand?

Do you thoroughly gravel vac it?

How much is your skimmer pulling a day? Dark or light coloured skimmate?

[Rogue951]

Chemi-pure elite has carbon, GFO and I feel some other things in the bag.
Get a couple those and throw those somewhere that will get water through it. (rinse the bag well)
or even poly filters.
It's def water perameter based if it's affecting your whole tank.
And yes Acro's can lose all their tissue in hours, hense RTN (Rapid Tissue Necrosis)
if your corals are tossing tissue then that's going to add to the bioload and make things worse so carbon (or the like) and waterchanges will at least slow things down.

Entirely possible this is related to your starfish death. There are some weird critters out in them oceans.

[sphelps]

All those symptoms are typically related to alkalinity, 7dkh is a bit low IME but if it's accurate and stable then not likely the issue but I'd try and confirm that number and bring up between 8 & 9 dkh. If you test kit doesn't give you a decimal it's not accurate enough.

[jason604]

Yes I am using a ro/do system. So I'm planning to do a 50% WC today and another one Tmr or Friday. I'm scared I won't be able to match temp alk/cal/mg exactly if I do a 80% and end up killing everything. So what is the shortest amount of time does it take to properly mix new salt water?

[Aquattro]

You can mix new salt water in 20 minutes or less with a good mixing pump. You don't need to worry about ca/alk/Mg for now, worry about SG and get temp as close as you can.

[jason604]

Did a 50% WC last night. A few zoas still closed. Most corals look ok but my purple acro that I fraged off the rtn base is stripping its base again!!

Do I have to frag off its base again?


Hammer is still showing its mouth

[Aquattro]

The acro will likely continue to recede, so ya, I'd cut it at the half way point. The hammer looks fine for now, I wouldn't worry too much. Are you running carbon?

[Spyd]

Yes, chop it again unfortunately. You will have to keep doing it until it stops RTNing or dies off...